66 "in the gall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity," was exhorted to pray-not with a hard and impenitent heart, but with a spirit of true contrition: Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps the thought of thy heart may be forgiven thee." To repent and pray is the same thing in effect as to pray penitently, or with a contrite spirit. Wicked men are required to read and hear the Word, but not with a wicked spirit; and to plough the soil, but not that they may consume its produce upon their lusts. There are not two sorts of requirements, or two standards of obedience-ore for good men, and the other for wicked men; the revealed will of God is one and the same, however differently creatures may stand affected towards it. The same things which are required of the righteous-as repentance, faith, love, prayer, and praise-are required of the wicked. (John xii. 36; Acts iii. 19; Rev. xv. 4.) If it were not so, and the aversion of the heart tended to set aside God's authority over it, it must of necessity follow that a sinner can never be brought to repentance, except it be for the commission of those sins which might have been avoided consistently with the most perfect enmity against God! And this is to undermine all true repentance; for the essence of true repentance is "godly sorrow," or sorrow for having displeased and dishonoured God. But if, in a state of unregeneracy, a man were under no obligation to please God, he must of course have been incapable of displeasing him; for where no law is, there is no transgression. The consequence is, he can never be sorry at heart for having displeased him; and as there would be but little if any ground for repentance toward God, so there would be but little if any need of faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ. If, in a state of unregeneracy, he were under no obligation to do anything pleasing to God, and were so far rendered incapable of doing anything to displease him, so far he must be sinless, and therefore stand in no need of a Saviour. Where there is no obligation, there can be no offence; and where there is no offence, there needs no forgiveness.Fuller. AS GOD DOES ENDEAVOUR, SO DOES SATAN, TO GAIN THE SOUL. "WE may learn this from our greatest enemy" that our souls are worth all our care and pains in keeping; seeing our adversary the devil thinks no pains too great to get them. He goeth up and down, "seeking whom he may devour." (1 Pet. v. 8.) He compasseth the earth, as we may read in the Book of Job (iii. 27). He had "considered" Job, and so considers all others-what temptation is likeliest to prevail; what their tempers and distempers are; what traps "will take some, and what snares others. He knows our beloved sins, and dresses them up, so as we might be loath to part with them. He did not desire to go into the herd of swine, that he might destroy them, but that by that means he might tempt their owners; as, indeed, it took effect-the Gadarenes preferring their swine before their souls, or their Saviour. (Matt. viii. 31-34.) When our Saviour came to cast him out of any one, the devil was tormented. "Why art thou come to torment us?" they cry. (Matt. viii. 29; Luke viii. 28.) It was not because they were forced to leave their bodies, but because by that means he should have no such opportunity to mischief prived of our souls! their souls, O, this is a torment to Satan-to be de There is not a sermon we hear, but this evil one is ready to take away the seed as soon as ever it is sown (Matt. xiii. 19); there is not a prayer we make but these "fowls" of the air attend to light upon the sacrifice, and hardly can they be driven away. (Gen. xv. 11.) Wheresoever we are, whatsoever we do, the devil attends and waits for advantage against us, that he might but gain our souls.-Vincke. EARLY RELIGION. O WHAT a credit, what a glory, is it to drink in the dews of godliness in the morning of your lives! What a lovely sight, to behold those trees blossoming with the fruits of the Spirit in the spring of their age! "Better is a poor and wise child than an old and foolish king." (Eccles. iv. 13.) What a garland of honour doth the Holy Ghost put on the head of an holy child! How profitable is early piety! Some fruits ripe early in the year are worth treble the price of later fruits. Godliness at any time brings in much gain (1 Tim. vi. 6); but he that comes first to the market is likely to make the best price of his ware. On the other side, how dangerous are delays! Remember, children, late repentance, like untimely fruits, seldom comes to anything. Your lives are very uncertain. As young as you are, you may be old enough for a grave. O then seek your God, and seek him when and "while he may be found." (Isa. lv. 6.) If thou refuse him now, he may refuse thee hereafter. I have heard of one that, deferring repentance to his old age, and then going about it, heard a voice, "Give him the bran to whom thou hast given the flour." Every day renders you more and more indisposed. The longer sin and Satan possess the forts of your hearts, the more they will fortify and strengthen them against God and holiness. (Jer. xiii. 23.) Your God deserves your youth. The best God deserves the best of days.-Lye. Fragments. SINS AFTER CONVERSION.--A sheep may slip into a slough as well as a swine. The difference is, that the sheep dreads a fall, and speedily rises from it; while it is a habit with the swine to be unclean, and to love the same condition as the other abhors. SCRIPTURE TRANSLATION.-An old Scotch divine observes that it is a great mercy to have our father's will in our mother's tongue. INFLUENCE OF THE WORLD.-A man that travelleth to the most desirable home, hath a habit of desire to it all the way; but his present business is his travel; and horse, and company, and inns, and ways, and weariness, may take up more of his sensible thoughts, and of his talk and action, than his home.-Baster. SCEPTICISM OF SATANIC AGENCY.-As the fowler would certainly spoil his own game, should he not keep out of sight; so the devil never plants his own shares so skilfully and successfully as when he conceals his person, nor tempts so dangerously as when he can persuade men that there is no tempter.-South. THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY. 565 REMEMBERING THE POOR. BY THE REV. JAMES BEGG, EDINBURGH. (Concluded from p. 514.) a reward of grace. And, without attempting to maintain what may appear to some a paradox, we might merely say, that a sweet contentment shall be the result of our generosity—a contentment and inward peace passing all understanding-for which princes might well exchange the comfortless splendours of their thrones. Our Saviour refers to this when he says, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." For there is a blessedness unspeakable in diffusing happiness around-in sheltering those who are outcasts upon a dreary world-in making the widow's heart to sing for joy. And if the result of our benevolence extends beyond this world, O what cause shall we have of triumph throughout an endless eternity, in having been instrumental in saving souls from death, arraying them in the robes of immortality, and in seeing them presented a shining throng, with palms of everlasting victory, to swell the ranks of the redeemed, to swell the glorious anthem of eternity! We might rest the whole question of our shrinking away, with an exclamation of surduty to the poor on express Scripture injunc-prise: "When saw we thee an hungered or tions; but we know that some, in practically athirst?" But still a great reward is promised, reasoning on this subject, are haunted by the impression, that in giving cheerfully to others they by so much diminish the sources of their own enjoyment; and, therefore, giving largely at least, is regarded by unbelieving men as implying weakness, though it may be regarded as amiable. Now, without replying that the same feeling might have prevented the Jews from leaving unreaped the corners of the fields, and from leaving the crop of the seventh year free to all, if it can be shown that God has declared that the very reverse of this is the case, and that not he that gives, but he that withholds, is cursed, we shall attack covetousness in its stronghold, strip it of its last argument, and leave no excuse for the neglect of a large and generous benevolence. And such we apprehend to be the statement of Scripture, viz., That giving to the poor, so far from bringing us to poverty, shall be one means most effectually to secure us against it; whilst, on the other hand, if we are unwilling to listen to the tale of misery, and hide our eyes from the distresses of our brethren, not one, but many, curses shall infallibly overtake us here and in the world of spirits. This leads me to the second point, which I intended to consider, viz., the reward of Christian benevolence. Let it be observed here, First, That no reward is ever deserved by any human being. All have sinned, and are justly exposed to the wrath of God. All do sin, and in God's sight no man living shall be justified. All true Christians rejoice to lie low in the dust before God, and to say: "We are unprofitable servants. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but to thy name be the glory." Even when they are in some measure conformed to the will of God, it is not they that do good, but God worketh in them, both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Secondly, No Christian expects any reward for his own sake, or as of debt. On the day of judgment, we find the saints No. 48.* But we prefer taking the words of Scripture in their plain and literal meaning. God, though he stands in no need of our assistance, though he could command the stones to become bread that the poor might eat, and the rocks to pour forth water, or the heavens, as of old, to rain down manna, has not merely prescribed this duty of providing for the destitute to us, but has encouraged us in the discharge of it by many express promises of a positive reward. As, that by giving to the poor 66 we lend to Him"-make him our debtor, whose is the earth, and the fulness thereof-who can give us silver for brass, and gold for silver-a treasure in heaven in return for our earthly substance; and who, though we sow in tears, will make us bring back our sheaves in a most plenteous and abundant harvest. Our alms shall come up with our prayers as a memorial before Him. He will prosper us in all our ways, and never suffer us to lack. "Blessed is he that considereth the poor: the Lord will deliver him in the time or "There is that scattereth and yet increaseth; there is that withholdeth more than is meet, and yet it tendeth to poverty "_" I have been young, and now am old, yet have I never seen the merciful man forsaken, nor his seed left to beg." But it is necessary, in estimating this view of the subject, to look beyond this world, in which our residence is only temporary-the mere threshold of an eternal existence and to consider, that unless assisted by God, we shall soon be poor indeed. The bed of death is prepar trouble." And no one can find any difficulty in perceiving the possibility of the fulfilment of these promises, who believes that God is the great Ruler in heaven and earth-that riches come not by chance, but by His appointment, through a thousand channels over which we have no control-that all the agents in the universe are at His command-that He makes the wind blow, or stills the sea into a calm, gives rain from heaven, and clothes our fields with beauty and fertility. Without Him the builder builds, and the husbandman sows and waters, the merchant traffics, and the labourering, and then our riches must forsake us; and labours, in vain. And on the other hand, riches depart by secret avenues, over which we have no control. God can easily, without visibly putting forth his hand from heaven, consume riches before the eyes, and in the very grasp, of the covetous man. In a moment can He turn back the current of his own benevolence, and leave the hard-hearted to experience all the poverty with which they so little sympathize. And it evidently is right that this should be done sometimes in the presence of the world, openly to confute Infidelity, and to put a difference between him that feareth God and him that feareth him not. Those who have never known what it is generously to distribute the blessings which God has conferred upon them, are no judges whether or | not they increase, as did the loaves of the Gospel, by distribution. But it is no evidence of the contrary, that some have been seen to give liberally, who still came to poverty; for mere giving does not constitute a fulfilment of the command of God—it is a giving from principle. Men may mingle with the glare of assembled multitudes, and go with the crowd to wonder at the eloquence of a favourite preacher, and being warmed into a hasty and unusual ecstasy, may give liberally to the poor. But they cannot expect that this should be accepted by God. It is the mere charity of feeling and ostentation. And if we think how much of this there is, we will not wonder if we see some miserable who have been seen publicly performing acts of benevolence. Blessedness were easily purchased if it could be obtained by the hasty conferring of some of our wealth, in the midst perhaps of pride and luxury, of villany and guilt, on those whom at other times we deride and despise. But it has been the unanimous testimony of all the redeemed who have spoken on this subject from the foundation of the world, that their store, like the widow's oil of old, has never suffered from distribution. our friends and our fame can profit us nothing. Who shall stand by us in the lonely hour? Who shall pass with us through the dark valley of the shadow of death?" He shall have judgment without mercy who showed no mercy" "Blessed is he that considereth the poor: the Lord shall deliver him in the day of trouble." And this is in perfect consistency with all the statements of Scripture. For he gave proof that he had been rescued from the selfishness and degradation of the fall-that he was being made fit by the Spirit of God to join the glorious society of heaven-that he had been taught of God to be in some measure a faithful steward of the goods committed to him. God shall also give him a crown of life-treasures of heavenblessings of this world, and that which is to come: "Well done, thou good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things; enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." On the other hand, it is only reasonable to expect that God should multiply curses upon him who retains unjustly that which He intended him to bestow on his perishing brethren-who seeks to frustrates all the purposes of Godwho sets an example so pernicious to his brethren around. We have often seen the threatening in the text fulfilled-riches wither in the grasp of men by whom they were unduly held, or given to strangers for a possession; for let us seize them however eagerly, and hide our eyes from the miseries of our brethren, there is still a God that judgeth in the earth. And then, when stretched upon a bed of languishing, when all earthly objects begin to fade from our sight, when our eyes begin to swim in death, is it to be believed that God will hear our imploring cries? The cries of the poor have ascended and entered the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. We laughed at calamities, and God will laugh at our calamity. "I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat; thirsty, and SILVIO PELLICO, AND ye gave me no drink. Depart from me, ye cursed." We remained as barren and fruitless trees cumbering the Almighty's vineyard, fit for nothing but to be hewn down and cast into the fire. The sin of hard-heartedness is most severely punished, because most contrary to the nature of God. "Cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness"-"For it shall come to pass, that if any one shall hear the words of this curse, and shall bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the sight of mine eyes, and in the imagination of my heart, the Lord will not spare that man, but his anger and his fury will smoke against him; and he will separate him unto evil from the midst of the congregation, and utterly blot out his memory from under heaven." Let us seek, then, by the omnipotent grace of God, to be enabled to follow Him who went about continually doing good-to let our light shine before men; and then when He who is our life shall appear, we shall also appear with him in glory. SILVIO PELLICO, AND THE BIBLE IN ITALY. MILAN was the city of one of Silvio Pellico's prisons. What a touching account he gives of the power of the Bible over him! The time is hastening, when it shall no longer be a strange book in Italy, nor its doctrines hidden. For six or seven days Silvio had been in a state of doubt, prayerlessness, and almost desperation. Yet he sang with a pretended merriment, and sought to amuse himself with foolish pleasantries. "My Bible," he says, "was covered with dust. One of the children of the jailer said to me one day, while caressing me, Since you have left off reading in that villain of a book, it seems to me you are not so sad as before."" Silvio had been putting on a forced gaiety. "It seems to you?" said he. "I took my Bible, brushed away the dust with a pocket-handkerchief, and opening it at hazard, my eyes fell upon these words: And he said to his disciples, It is impossible but that of fences will come, but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh. It were better for him that a millstone were cast about his neck, and he thrown into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.' "Struck with meeting these words, I was ashamed that this little child should have perceived, by the dust with which my Bible was covered, that I read it no more, and that he should have supposed that I had become more sociable and pleasant by forgetting God. I was completely desolate at having so scandalized him. You little rogue,' said I, with a caressing reproof, this is not a rillain book, and during the several days that I have neglected to read in it, I am become much worse. My singing that you have heard is only a force-put, and my ill-humour, which I try to drive away when your mother lets you in to see me, all comes back when I am alone.' "The little child went out, and I experienced a degree of satisfaction at having got my Bible again in my hands, and at having confessed that without it I had grown worse. cried I, and I was perverted! and I could even "And I had abandoned thee, O my God!' believe that the infamous laugh of the cynic and sceptic was suited to my despairing condition!" "These tears were a thousand times sweeter than my brutish joy. I saw my God again! I him in degrading myself, and I promised never loved him! I repented that I had so insulted more to be separated from him-never. "I read and wept and lamented during more than an hour, and arose full of confidence in the thought that God was with me, and that he had pardoned my delirium. Then my misfortunes, the torments of the trial, the probability of the torture, appeared to me a very little thing. I could rejoice in suffering, since I might follow a sacred duty, which was, to obey the Saviour, in suffering with resignation." There are still hearts like Silvio Pellico's in Italy, and when the word of God comes to this people, it will have all the greater power for having been so long kept from them. When the spirit of the mouth of the Lord kindles the fire, it will spread among Italian hearts like a flame in the dry grass of the prairies. Under this fire the superstitions of Romanism would perish. The idolatry of forms can no more stand against the burning spirit of God's word, than the seared leaves and withered branches of the woods in autumn could stand before a forest conflagration. Frank-hearted Silvio Pellico! how many a man has let the dust grow thick upon his Bible, not in prison merely, but even his family Bible, even with dear children around him, and never confessed his sin, never gone back with tears of contrition to that holy book, nor taught it in his household, nor had the light of truth divine, the light from heaven shining on it! How like a dungeon with false and foul thoughts, must every heart be, out of which God and the dear light of his word are excluded! Yea, though there may be laughter there, it is like poor Silvio's false and forced despairing merriment; it is like the crackling of thorns under a pot. Heavy laws are upon such a man; and when friends depart, and he sees himself in prison, sees how he is in prison, even though he walks in the open air, then there is desolation indeed.-Rev. Dr. Checter's Pilgrim of the Jungfrau. THE BELIEVER'S POWER TO DO GREATER WORKS THAN THOSE OF CHRIST. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go to the Father."— Jou xiv. 12. THE kingdom of God on earth may be said to be always in progress, but there are certain periods in its history when the advances it makes are more striking and peculiar. Its course, sometimes, at least, proceeds by grand stages, which, as they successively arrive, bring such important changes into the condition of its members, that men may be accounted little or great in the kingdom, according to the position they occupy in respect to these. David stood nobly pre-eminent above the men of his own generation for the strength of his faith, and the rich variety of his spiritual gifts; yet the Prophet Zechariah gave promise of a time when even "he that is feeble should be as David." John the Baptist, who had the singular honour of being the immediate forerunner of Christ in his office, rose on this account so far superior to all who had gone before him, that Christ declared him to be the greatest that till then had been born of woman; yet not only did he feel himself so little in comparison of Christ, as to be unworthy to unloose the latchet of his shoe, but Christ also determined his place to be below that of those who should henceforth be regarded as of smaller stature in the kingdom. So great a change to the better was effected by the personal appearance of Christ. And though Christ himself must ever have immeasurably the pre-eminence above all whom he calls his brethren, yet so mighty a step in advance was his kingdom to take, as to the development of its powers on earth, in consequence of his departure to heaven, that his disciples, he tells us, were to be enabled to perform works, not only equal, but even superior to his own. This last declaration, however, appears somewhat more strange and startling than the others. For what works, we are naturally disposed to ask, could properly be said to surpass, or even to rival, his? Did they not bear upon them the clear and manifest impress of Godhead? It must surely have been impossible for any one, in a spirit of humble faith, to follow Jesus along the path of miraculous working which he pursued on earth, to see him, as often as occasion required, with a word healing the sick, giving eyes to the blind, relieving those who were oppressed of the devil, hushing to rest the boisterous winds of heaven, and even restoring to life the victims of death and the grave-it must have been impossible for such an one to follow Jesus in the prosecution of this wonderful career, without feeling himself to be in the presence of God manifest in the flesh, and al most instinctively exclaiming, "What works are like unto thy works?" And unquestionably they were the works of Godhead, and bore witness to the truth announced at his birth, that he was, in the strictest sense," the Son of the Highest." For they were not only performed through his instrumentality, but by his own inherent might, as equal in power and glory with the Father; so that he could put them on a footing with the essential operations of Godhead, and say, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." But this is not the point of view in which our Lord is contemplating his works in the passage before us, and drawing a comparison between them and such works as his disciples should be enabled to perform. For when he speaks of similar, or even greater works being done by them, it is not as of themselves, but through their believing upon him, that such works were to be done; it was still Christ's divine power and Godhead that these were to display, only discovering itself through the agency of his believing disciples. And the peculiar honour conferred upon them in the matter was, that as instruments of divine working, they were to be the doers of works such as did not proceed even from Christ's own hand, during the period of his personal ministry. But what proof can be produced that the believer on Jesus has been thus honoured? We learn that his immediate disciples did perform works in considerable numbers, that might fitly be called the same with his-manifesting not only the same self-denying and beneficent labours for the good of men, but also the same exercise of supernatural power to remedy disease and suffering, and occasionally even to restore the dead to life. But if in these we find the same works, where are we to look for the greater ones? What traces have earlier or later believers been enabled to leave of such? The greatness of a work must depend, either upon the powerful command it wields over elements naturally stiff and intractable, or upon the magnitude of the results that spring from it. If the person who works has been enabled to master an opposing force of gigantic strength, and bend it into conformity to his own purposes, or if what he does is replete with extensive and lasting benefits, then, in either case alike, the work fitly deserves to be characterized as a great one. But, in both respects, works have often proceeded from the hands of believers greater than those which were done during our Lord's personal ministry on earth. For, of all things in nature, what is so mighty in energy, and so hard to be controlled, as the will of man? Who can turn it from its determined purpose! When it chooses (and ah! when does it fail to choose, if left to itself, to turn away from the path of salvation?) it can hold to its course against the clearest light, the most convincing |